09/06/2025 - For centuries, the Phoenicians have been remembered as master sailors, tireless merchants, and skilled craftsmen. Originating from the Levant—roughly modern-day Lebanon—they sailed westward across the Mediterranean from the 9th century BCE, founding coastal cities from Cyprus to Carthage and beyond. But what happened when they settled? Did they remain a distinct people, or did they blend into the genetic fabric of the regions they touched?
Thanks to ancient DNA, we are now closer than ever to answering that question.
Genetic Footprints from the Levant to Iberia
Recent studies have revealed that Phoenician expansion was not simply a cultural diffusion—it also involved real human movement and admixture. In 2018, researchers published a groundbreaking analysis of a Punic ...See more
05/06/2025 - France’s population has undergone profound transformations over the past 9,000 years, shaped by successive waves of migration and admixture. Thanks to advances in paleogenomics, we can now retrace the evolution of genetic ancestries from Mesolithic hunter-gatherers to the early medieval period. This article synthesizes major studies and integrates real ancient samples from multiple phases to provide a clear timeline of France's genetic history.
1. The Mesolithic: Western Hunter-Gatherers (WHG)
Around 7000 BCE, France was inhabited by Western Hunter-Gatherers (WHG), descendants of Paleolithic populations who survived the Last Glacial Maximum. New genomic data highlight the local diversity of this population.
WHG ancestry: ~95% WHG, trace Early European Farmer (EEF)
...See more
02/06/2025 - Introduction
The Jewish people, dispersed across continents yet culturally cohesive, have long maintained traditions of shared ancestry and origin in ancient Israel. With the advent of ancient DNA analysis, science now confirms what history, oral tradition, and identity have claimed for millennia: the genetic continuity of Jewish populations from the ancient Levant into medieval Europe — and through them, to many modern Jews today.
Ancient Roots, Medieval Lives
Recent studies published in bioRxiv (Waldman et al., 2022) and Current Biology (Brace et al., 2022) provide unprecedented insight into the genetic makeup of Jewish individuals who lived in medieval Germany and England. Samples from Erfurt (ca. 1350 CE) and Norwich (ca. 1180 CE) exhibit unmistakable signs of ancest...See more
30/05/2025 - Introduction
The question of how the Americas were first populated has long fascinated archaeologists and geneticists alike. The prevailing hypothesis suggests that humans migrated from northeast Asia through Beringia—an ancient land bridge that once connected Siberia and Alaska—during the Last Glacial Maximum, approximately 20,000 years ago. Yet this theory has often been debated, with alternative models proposing trans-Pacific or even trans-Atlantic migrations.
Recent breakthroughs in paleogenomics have allowed researchers to analyze the DNA of ancient individuals from both Siberia and the Americas. These findings, when combined with formal modeling using tools like G25 PCA and genetic distance calculations, strongly support the Beringian hypothesis. Furthermore, the earlie...See more
29/05/2025 - Recent breakthroughs in ancient DNA have begun to rewrite our understanding of Iron Age Britain and its relationship with continental Europe. Three major studies—focusing on Iron Age genomes from Normandy, burials from southern Britain, and new mobility analyses in northern France—reveal strong genetic and cultural ties across the English Channel. Together, these findings suggest that the Durotriges may not have been an isolated insular group, but rather the product of a complex fusion between Celtic populations from both sides of the sea.
A Genetic Dialogue Across the Channel
Genome-wide data from Iron Age individuals in Normandy (e.g., UN129, UN19, UN85) align closely with Durotrigian individuals excavated in Dorset, especially LTH01 and several from the Winterbor...See more
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